Sweet Smell Of Success

By By ANNE C. HEYMEN, Staff Betty Mills has many colorful plants blooming in her Leon Street landscape. She seems to particularly enjoy talking about her rose bushes.

Partial to shades of pink, she mentions the dark pink Carefree Wonder, which she calls a "lazy rose" since it pretty much thrives on its own and requires little care. And, these bushes can grow quite large.

Then there's the pink Bonica; Old Blush, a "real fragrant pink"; Abraham Darby, a peach colored blend that also has a wonderful scent; a "pinkish" climber, New Dawn; and a pink Don Juan that is usually seen in the more common deep red.

Mills fertilizes her roses using a mixture of Vigero rose food, Epson salts, triple superphosphate and bone meal. This combo is spread around the base of her plants "every four weeks." She also mixes banana peels in the soil for an extra potassium boost and bone meal for phosphorus.

Also in her landscape are bougainvillea, in the brilliant fuchsia color. She uses "super phosphate every four weeks" on these vines.

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CAREFREE WONDER roses grace the entrance to the Mills home.

Other plantings include geraniums, Confederate jasmine, hibiscus, crape myrtles, citurs and she has a vegetable garden.

Then there's a hummingbird garden with such attractants as nicotiana, bottlebrush, firecracker plant and cape honeysuckle with its clusters of showy orange-red flowers. A butterfly garden includes milkweed, curly parsley, penta and lantana.

She uses mostly the slow release Osmocote to fertilize many of her plants.

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This bougainvillea clings to a fence on the Mills property. Thats a lavendar petunia in a hanging basket, to the left.

Also on the property is a small fish pond that Mills created.

Mills tries to spend time every day tending to her gardens and plants.

She's has resided on her property for the past 10 years and has accomplished a great deal with the small 50-by-100 foot lot.